Links found whilst Googling "Christian Erotica."

There are perfectly good, rational reasons why I'm looking up erotica and romance and Christianity and...okay, there's no good reason for the dolls. But for MOST of it, there's a rational explanation. It's just the RESULTS that are irrational.


1. A Little Leaven bills itself as "A Museum of Idolatry," and bears the not-quite-informative subtitle, "This Is What Happens When the Church Fails to Remain Faithful to the Correct Preaching and Teaching of God's Word." The "this" of that statement, oddly enough, includes Evangelical Sex, which is one of the things the blog monitors. Until I saw that blog, I'd never heard of churches that use sex as a means of attracting or maintaining members. I swear I meant "members" in the non-euphemistic way there, though the other meaning seems to be equally true of those churches. It's not all sex at A Little Leaven--recent posts include a Crucifix whistle and Astronaut Jesus--but there is, yeah, a fair lot of sex. Enough so that you can fetch up at the blog by googling "Christian Erotica," anyway.

A few examples, found via A Little Leaven:
i. Time Magazine: And God Said, "Just Do It." Nike might want to speak to God, or, if He was misquoted, to Time, about that.
ii. Intimate Issues, where, in the words of an unnamed couple, "We discovered that God’s Word is holy and hot..."
iii. Relevant Church (as distinct from all those irrelevant ones) hosts the 30-Day Sex Challenge.

2. Next up, KinkyChristians dot com: "It is the controversial viewpoint that a loving Christian husband will use his authority and headship in a marriage in a very proactive, non-passive way to help his wife grow and mature. She is expected to submit, and he is to love and protect her – both following the roles that conservative Christians often at least in general agree upon." I'll just interrupting the quoting for a moment to mention that, while the concept of a wife being unquestionably less mature than her husband is annoying, it's not a lot more annoying than the opposite assumption, that all men are like children at best--wanting toys, needing supervision, unable to dress themselves or relate in any emotionally sophisticated way--or at worst like teenagers in some sort of perpetual heat. That sort of casual reduction of men happens all the time in mainstream media, and it's just as dehumanizing and wrong. I know treating people as idiots based on their sex/gender is wrong, okay? I'm not condoning that. Just thought I'd point that out: VIEWS QUOTED HERE ARE NOT NECESSARILY MY OWN.

"This leads to a belief in limited physical discipline (God's chastising, such as in Hebrews 12 and Proverbs) to lovingly keep his wife accountable to his authority under God. In these relationships, the wife at times wants the relationship to be this way, feeling that the husband is showing practical love when he corrects her for sinful habits or other things." And then they very very very carefully state that this isn't BDSM, not at all, no sir, nothing like it. Because they wouldn't want you to have the wrong impression or think this was just for pleasure or anything. Although seriously, a different URL might go a long way towards image management there, guys. "Kinky Christians dot com" creates a certain impression.

"Keep in mind that this is all in the context of a Christian Marriage. In fact, pastors are involved with this concept. It is hard to judge how common this is, given the fear of being laughed at or judged if others find out that this is your conviction." A legitimate fear if I ever heard one, especially when you say things like "Passivity in a man is a denial of manhood - he is called to love her like Christ loves the church," a phrase which, although Biblical-ish, has regrettably left me with some rather unforgettable Good News: Christ tops.

3. But less hilariously, although arguably more erotically, that page is part of a whole larger....thing. I hesitate to use the word "movement," and I don't know if "trend" fits. It's a blending of Fundamentalist Christianity and BDSM, and it calls itself Domestic Discipline, and I've known about it for ages for reasons too convoluted to go into here. Anyway. The site I'm linking to there is Leah Kelly's Christian Domestic Discipline, all about spanking in a Christian context. Don't knock it 'til you've tried it, I guess. DISCLAIMER: THAT WAS NOT MEANT TO READ AS IF I WAS NECESSARILY PLANNING TO TRY IT.

It's difficult to pick just one thing to quote from their essays, but I've settled on this gem, from the section on introducing your spouse to the idea of CDD: "1. Husbands, you are in a stickier situation. It is one thing to tell your husband you need correction, but it is quite another to tell your wife she needs discipline. Take it slowly. Maybe consider introducing it to her a bit at a time." I think we can all agree with the (inadvertently graphic--at least, I hope that was inadvertent) soundness of that bit of advice.

4. I am going to assume that "Sex in Christ" is some sort of satire. It can't be real. I mean (and if you haven't turned back already, seriously, you might want to bail NOW):

Anal Sex in Accordance with God's Will has to be a joke, right? There is no way this was written to be taken seriously: "Are you saving yourself for your wedding night? The Devil wants you to fail, that’s why he puts stumbling blocks in your way. But God wants you to succeed, and that’s why he has given us an alternative to intercourse before marriage: anal sex. Through anal sex, you can satisfy your body’s needs, while you avoid the risk of unwanted pregnancy and still keep yourself pure for marriage." It has to be some ghastly parody.
And I can't even bring myself to quote their page about fisting.